Wilhelm Lexis

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Wilhelm Lexis (between 1900 and 1914)
Wilhelm Lexis

Wilhelm Lexis (born July 17, 1837 in Eschweiler (Rhineland) , † August 24, 1914 in Göttingen ) was a German mathematician , statistician and economist .

Life

Wilhelm Lexis came from a family of doctors in Eschweiler, his father was Ernst Joseph Lexis . He attended the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Gymnasium in Cologne and studied mathematics and physics in Bonn from 1855 . In 1859 August Beer received his doctorate with a thesis in mathematical physics, after which he worked for Robert Wilhelm Bunsen in Heidelberg . In 1861 he went for Economic Studies abroad and was established in 1872 an associate professor of economics at the newly founded Kaiser Wilhelm University of Strasbourg , 1874 Professor of Geography, Ethnography and Statistics at the University of Tartu and in 1876 Professor of Economics at the University of Freiburg . In 1884 he became a full professor of political science at the University of Breslau , and in 1887 a full professor of economics at the University of Göttingen , where he carried out extensive teaching and research activities until his death. In 1910 he was elected a full member of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences .

Among other things, he developed the dispersion theory on the variance of statistical rates with temporal fluctuations and was the founder of the first German university seminar for insurance science with Felix Klein . Its statistical publications are particularly important. As an opponent of Menger's marginal utility theory, Lexis represented an objective theory of values ​​and sought to replace the purely conceptual with a mathematical method that was as realistic as possible. His work in the mathematical-statistical field, especially on population statistics and on currency and insurance issues, was of lasting importance.

From 1891 to 1897 Wilhelm Lexis published the yearbooks for economics and statistics , also known as Conrads yearbooks.

In these yearbooks he had already published a criticism of the 2nd volume of the capital (by Karl Marx ) in 1885 , to which Friedrich Engels referred in his foreword to the 1st edition of the 3rd volume. (See there, p. 16.)

The Wilhelm Lexis Street in Eschweiler industrial park IGP was established in 1992; In Berlin-Köpenick there has been a Lexisstrasse since 1930 .

Fonts

  • De generalibus motus legibus . Diss. Bonn 1859 ( University of Dorpat ; PDF file; 1.77 MB)
  • Introduction to the theory of population statistics . Karl Trübner, Strasbourg 1875 ( Göttingen digitization center )
  • On the theory of mass phenomena in human society . Ms. Wagner'sche Buchhandlung, Freiburg i. B. 1877 ( University of Dorpat ; PDF file; 3.11 MB)
  • The representation graphique de la mortalité au moyen des points mortuaires . Annales de demographie internationale, IV, 1880, pp. 297-324 Gallica
  • Memorandum on the normal number of students in the various faculties corresponding to Prussia's needs. 2. Processing. Printed as a manuscript . Kaysler, Berlin 1891 Read digital texts from the library of the Seminar for Economic and Social History as pdf
  • The current status of the currency issue: ... along with e. Anh. V. Zahn & Jaensch, Dresden 1895 ( digitized version )
  • Treatises on the theory of population and moral statistics . Gustav Fischer, Jena 1903 ( University of Dorpat ; PDF file; 8.30 MB)
  • General Economics . BG Teubner, Berlin, Leipzig 1910 ( University of Dorpat ; PDF file; 12.17 MB)

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Holger Krahnke: The members of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen 1751-2001 (= Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Philological-Historical Class. Volume 3, Vol. 246 = Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class. Episode 3, vol. 50). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-82516-1 , p. 150.
personal data
SURNAME Lexis, Wilhelm
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German economist, national economist and statistician
DATE OF BIRTH July 17, 1837
PLACE OF BIRTH Eschweiler
DATE OF DEATH August 24, 1914
Place of death Goettingen